


You Can Plan on Me

by thenopetrain



Category: The Blacklist (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen, secret santa gift
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-26
Updated: 2016-12-28
Packaged: 2018-09-12 08:11:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9063673
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thenopetrain/pseuds/thenopetrain
Summary: A little Christmas AU





	1. I'll Be Home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mymostpreciousking](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=mymostpreciousking).



> This is for the blacklist secret santa over on Tumblr. Merry Christmas, mymostpreciousking! I hope you enjoy it! ^^ Just a few holiday scenes for ya. I hope you had a wonderful holiday! Sorry this turned out a bit more angsty than I had expected.

The last time Liz had seen Red, he'd made eye contact with her just before being shoved into the back of a LandRover.

That was a little over forty hours ago.

The team had gotten back from Vienna just this afternoon. Having taken down a banking mogul in connection to hundreds of billions of dollars worth of laundered money for the Cabal, they were all, understandably, exhausted, but none of them were exactly willing to go home right away. They'd milled about the Post Office after Liz and Ressler had swung by the sitter's to pick up Agnes, and finally, the team found themselves gathered around the space around Aram's desk.

The forty-second hour mark rolled around.

Still no call.

Samar had taken to showing Agnes a few card tricks, which, Liz joked, was just a way to hone her daughter's penchant for being sneaky. There were mentionings of family visits by both Ressler and Aram, and, when pressed, Liz told them that Red had planned a surprise for Agnes this coming weekend. _Three days from now._ She hadn't thought that he would be...well, _missing_ wasn't exactly the right word most of the time, but the worry was no different.

It wasn't until another hour of waiting that Cooper called it a night for all of them; ushering the team into the elevator with a soft voice and a touch of consternation when they protested.

"But mommy," Agnes looked up at her as the elevator doors closed, clearly against leaving this place without Red firmly in toe.

"Don't worry, Pumpkin, he'll be home in time." Liz smiled and smoothed her hand over the top of her daughter's head, catching Cooper's sympathetic glance her way when her daughter asked,

"Promise?"

"Promise." And though she wasn't sure if Red would be breaking that promise she'd just made, there was little else to do besides reassure her daughter that all was well as she and Agnes wished everyone a Merry Christmas and headed home.

* * *

A kind of stillness had settled over the apartment when Liz awakened on the couch. Her hand reached out in a flash to grip the gun she'd placed on the coffee table. Her stomach flooded with nerves as she sat up, the blanket over her shoulders falling to the couch. The night was blue. A waxing moon gave off just enough light to catch on the snow still covering the ground in pockets from DC's last storm. Everything about the city seemed to hold its breath, a sort of pregnant anticipation for anything other than the silence that spread through the streets and filled each nook and cranny.

Waiting for dawn.

Waiting for movement.

For the city to wake up.

For life to move on.

Liz's hand flexes around her weapon as she checks her corners. When nothing moves, she peers at the front door. Locked and bolted shut. The darkness of the kitchen didn't move, nothing seemed to be lurking, and her eyes couldn't make out any abnormalities anywhere else either in the apartment.

Satisfied that there is no immediate danger, she takes a deep breath, sagging back into the couch cushions, and surveys the shadows around her, still bothered. Nothing seemed to be out of place, but like anyone used to living on the edge, she knew that there was something off about the apartment. It was as though the very air was being taken up by some added presence. With nothing discernible about the change in the atmosphere of the place, a shiver races down her arms.

Aberrant thoughts of ghosts and glimpses of Christmases past and yet to come, flash unbidden through her mind. On impulse, she checks her phone for the time, finds it well past a decent hour, and, with a near tangible disappointment about her with no word still from Red, she flips the safety of her gun back into place. Shaking herself of what must be the eeriness of the hour and the moonlight infiltrating the apartment through the windows, she moves to push up off the couch. It isn't until she takes a step towards the hall that she feels a cool sensation through her socks.

Peering down through the dark, she finds melting snow on the carpet under her socks, and when she follows the trail, she finds it leading from the door, to the couch, where her eyes fall to the blanket. _A blanket I definitely didn't have before_. Liz doesn't bother to check the continued path of the snowy footprints trailing down the hallway. Instead, on instinct, Elizabeth finds her gun leading the way quietly through the door as she enters her daughter's bedroom; a thing more out of habit than fear or necessity.

Her eyes fall to her little girl's bed and she leans against the door frame at the sight of Red curled around Agnes on the twin-sized mattress; relief like a fire in her blood. Normally, her daughter would be a starfish in her sleep, limbs flung outward, the comforter around her ankles. But right now, she's turned to nestle into the fabric of Red's suit and jacket, her hands fisted in fierce possession of the material before her. It's then, the uncomfortable wetness of her socks chilling her toes, that she finds Red's snowy, dirty shoes still on his feet; no doubt soaking the fabric of Agnes's comforter. She frowns a little at his apparent lack of attention to this small but important detail. It wasn't like him to deliberately make a mess.

Setting her weapon on her daughter's dresser, Liz quietly makes her way to the bed and begins untying his shoes before gently pulling them off; careful not to let his socked feet fall back into the wet spot of the comforter. She sets his shoes on the floor at the foot of the bed, and turns to eye his fedora hanging on the bed post above his head.

Gathering up the details for a hint of where he's been since she last saw him, her gaze travels down to the man himself. By the small glow of Agnes's nightlight, she can see the faint glint of stubble reaching around Red's cheeks to meet his sideburns, the slight scab of blood at the edge of his brow on the left side of his face, a longer cut above his ear on the same side.

Something in her chest catches, and Liz can feel that familiar helplessness take hold of her heart and lungs as she looks to Red's face. Nearly two whole days and he hasn't shaven, or taken the time to really clean himself up for them the way he usually does. That helplessness is a strangling emotion in her throat and she tries to swallow away the temptation to wake him and ask where the hell he's been and why he is the way he is and who in God's name did this? _And why didn't you call?_

First the snow all through the house, then his shoes and coat and suit still on, and now his disheveled appearance? Liz finds herself standing just in line with where his hips are, trying to get a better look at all the little injuries done to his face and head, wondering about concussions, having been aware of how awful she was about tending to herself after one. Like an itch she can't scratch, she wonders again about waking him, checking him over, getting him changed into something more comfortable than-

"Mommy," Agnes's big eyes are glaring up at her over Red's shoulder. At some point, Liz had started to reach out for Red's arm, but her daughter's sharp whisper has frozen her mid-gesture. Liz draws her hand back and shrugs at Agnes's imploring stare. It's in the small moments after this that Liz becomes aware of another sound in the room: Red's breathing, that slow and steady cadence of sleep. Agnes has turned her attention away from her mother and her small hand has moved to lay gently on the side of Red's face. Her finger softly taps the space just below the scab on his brow and, when he doesn't wake, she frowns deeply.

" _Papa_ ," She whispers her father's name with a scolding note that perfectly matches Elisabeth's own when she's being stern, except there's no fire behind her daughter's soft exclamation. If anything, it's a reaction to finding him in such a state as he is now. Liz watches her daughter in fascination as her little hand withdraws and she stares at the stubble on his face, her father having so rarely not shaved, that this was a foreign concept to her.

"He's okay, Aggie." Liz whispers, taking a seat in the space carved out by Red's bent knees. After a moment, seeing that he really wasn't going to be awakened so easily, she leans over his legs to place her hand near her daughter's foot, and turns her attention to a bit of discoloration she can see in the slate gray of his slacks along his thigh; dust and other particles as evidence of sitting or lying down on a dirty surface. _Or getting knocked to the ground unconscious._

Her stomach flips, and Liz starts to believe she really _should_ investigate his health a little better now that she's found him the way she has. If she were to turn the light on fully, she wonders what other remnants she'd find of his being handled roughly once again.

"But mommy," Drawn to her daughter's shadowed face, Liz raises her eyebrows expectantly, humming in curiosity for her daughter's serious tone. "Papa's face is _never_ scratchy." It is said as though it perfectly disproves Liz's original statement; her daughter drawing the correct and obvious conclusion that the man between them was not, in fact, _okay_. She feels herself smile, and she thinks the little girl has her beat there when she notices that Red's eyes slide open to blink at Agnes.

"Shouldn't you two be in bed?" His voice rumbles into the room, and somehow, the sound of it makes the apartment warmer, safer, steadier. The terrible stillness, the gnawing anticipation, vanishes without any evidence of it having been there. Agnes giggles and wrinkles her nose at his tired frown.

"I _am_ in bed, papa," Red makes a show of looking up and around him in the dark, his eyes carefully skipping over Liz as he determines where he is for their daughter's benefit.

"Huh," his eyes close again and he turns his face into Agnes's pillow a little more. "Are you sure this isn't my bed?" He angles his torso toward Agnes and throws his left arm over their daughter, lightly pinning her to the bed as he attempts to take up more room than he already has. Before the girls know it, Liz has been bumped into a standing position and Agnes has been consumed by the majority of Red's shoulder. There's a peel of laughter from their little girl, muffled by the fabric of Red's coat, and Liz reaches out to pinch the back of his thigh, eliciting a slight jerk of his leg, before lightly tugging at his shoulder for him to roll back over.

The man doesn't budge an inch.

"Papa!" Agnes's giggles produce a smile on the half of Red's face that Liz can see. "Get. _Off!_ "

"Hmm, maybe you're right." He finally rolls back over onto his side, but leaves his arm around Agnes. "This bed is far too small for me."

Father and daughter look at each other with twin smirks before Agnes's eyes widen a little and her hands lift to cup both sides of his face. Liz is leaning over them just enough to see their faces, and she recognizes the signs of exhaustion in Red's features, the kind that speak of conversations to come and burdens to bear. In Agnes's, she sees only the realization of something having been figured out.

"I know why you like my room, tonight." She whispers, her eyes big and full of courage.

"Oh?"

"Because the bad things are back." Liz can't help the sharp intake of breath, nor the need to grip Red's shoulder a little harder. For a long moment, both his girls watch his brow furrow and his face sag in the way that speaks of grief. After a slow and measured exhalation of breath through his nose, there's a soft,

"Yeah," before Agnes, still holding her father's face between her hands, leans up and touches her forehead to his own; pulling his head down a little to account for their height difference. Red's arm circles around his daughter a little tighter, and he squeezes his eyes shut as Agnes closes her own as well.

In the silence, Liz watches this routine with the eyes of someone who has just discovered a very precious treasure. With this simple interaction there is a procession of tiny moments replaying in the back of her mind.

_A two year old Agnes dragging her blanket and dolly into their room when Red was laid up after a shootout in Italy. How she'd simply clambered up onto Liz's side of the bed to silently wait for Red to wake up._

_Red pacing the nursery with a fussy, feverish baby in his arms when she caught a cold._

_Her and Red walking into a full-on flour war between Dembe and Agnes in the kitchen after a long day trying to fish out an identity forger Red needed information from._

_Her and Agnes glaring, miserably sunburned, at a freshly tanned Reddington while they sat on a couch eating ice cream after a long day out on the ocean._

_Watching her eight-and-a-half-month old teeter and totter her way to Red across the latest safe house foyer for the first time and the subsequent months spent chasing after an inexhaustibly curious Agnes as she honed her walking skills._

_Liz rolling her eyes every time a new safe house was required as Aram, Ressler, and Samar, the affectionately named "Baby Triumvirate", made all the drawers, corners, doors, and toilets Agnes Safe™. Supervised by Raymond, Harold, and Dembe, Father's Inc._

_Waking up in the hospital after an explosion to the sight of Agnes asleep on her father's chest._

_Her running into Mercy General's ER to find Agnes with Charlene, a hot pink cast around her arm, and a harrowing tale about swinging on the swings too high. A story her father did not find entertaining until Agnes told it to him herself that night when she was back, safe and sound, in her own bed._

_The small affections from Red: tying a bow in Agnes's hair, tickling her, bumping their daughter's arm when they're up to something, the big hugs, tossing her into the air and catching her again, the animated stories at bedtime..._

They all led her to this new moment, and Liz wonders why she's never seen them do this before.

" _There_ ," Agnes pulls away in the same moment that she pushes Red back so she can look into his eyes again. "All better?" Red blinks slowly at their daughter and nods his head.

"All better," He leans forward and plants a kiss on her forehead, before leveraging himself up with a barely repressed groan. Liz snakes her hand around his arm to help him, and for the first time since she found him, he turns and makes eye contact with her. Liz knows Agnes is watching them carefully, far too perceptive for a five-year old, so she simply squeezes Red's arm before drawing back. There's a small nod from him and three, quiet good night's echo around the room before Liz and Red make their way to the kitchen where Liz seats her troublesome criminal at the bar while she digs around for their first aid kit.

"I'm sorry," he says, watching her stretch up to reach into the cabinet between the sink and the one with the mugs.

"It's okay," But Red drops his gaze to his hands resting in his lap, distracted. There's a grimace on his face when she turns around and she knows it's the one that says he's beating himself up over something or other.

"I wanted to be home before we had to be at the cabin this weekend and I would have had Dembe clean me up, but I was so annoyed that this entire ordeal had already taken so long that I didn't even think about it, and I saw you on the couch, and then Agnes asleep, and I-" He's hushed by Liz who sets the kit on the top of the bar and steps up between his legs to gently take hold of his face the way their daughter had a few minutes ago.

"Raymond," His eyes travel up her body and his own hands fall to her waist. His tired expression meets hers with a deep breath. " _It's alright_." She smooths her thumbs over his slightly stubbly face and finds herself grinning at him.

"What?" His brow furrows in confusion at her expression and he manages to look a little suspicious of her just then.

"Nothing, it's just," She leans down and kisses him softly, a thing that lingers and reassures, when she pulls back. "You _are_ pretty scratchy." He makes a face, and she drops her hands to his shoulders, kneading them through the fabric there for a moment while her eyes drift from the scab on his brow to the cut on the side of his head. She's unaware that she is frowning a little until he reaches up and grabs her hands and brings them to his mouth to lay a kiss to each palm. Liz's breath catches in her chest, and Red glances up at the small sound with eyes that swim in an expression she is often hesitant to name.

"You don't have to explain," Her voice is soft, her hands gripped gently around his own where he holds them against his chest. She watches one of his eyebrows lift in obvious surprise for, usually, Elizabeth Keen does not sidestep an opportunity for answers to _anything._ "I mean, I'm _damn_ curious why you didn't call, and why they took you for so long, and why you're banged up a bit, and I _will_ probably ask you about that later, but right now?"

There's the memory of reading a redacted file three years ago. A memory of handling the history of the man before her with such care and trepidation it might as well have been a grenade without a pin on the desk before her that day. _Everything about me is a lie._ There had been no words then to describe the horrible story that unfolded before her, and there aren't any now. It is simply a tale of ghosts that will always haunt the living, a brand that very rarely stops burning, an explosion whose concussive force was still dissipating through time.

 _"_ I'm just glad you made it home before this weekend." It was an unspoken truth in their household around the Christmas season that Raymond Reddington would be a different person. Oh sure, the magnanimous and charismatic traits were still there, he was still an infuriatingly cunning criminal, he was still eccentric and pushy about eating this or drinking that, but the holidays would always leave him open for attack, and Liz didn't always anticipate those vulnerabilities.

"I'm glad you two were here, earlier." He swallows thickly and his grip tightens just a little more on her hands. His eyes don't avoid her this time, and when she looks up, those ripples of the past have appeared again. Elizabeth has seen him in all states over the years, and it is this one, the one that bears the weight of tragedy, grief, and the likelihood of it happening again, that makes her feel the most helpless in her attempts to comfort him. It is an exclusive fear, reserved for sharing among those he counts as family.

Sighing, wanting nothing more than to pull him to bed and wrap her arms around him until their daughter comes bouncing in all ready to go in the morning, she extracts her left hand from his to lay it on the side of his face.

"We're going to go up to the cabin in two days, we're going to do whatever it is you have planned for us up there, we're going to have a wonderful time," She tilts his face up just a little more towards her and he leans into her touch, letting his eyes slip closed for a moment before opening them again to meet her own. "And it isn't going to happen again, Raymond, do you hear me?" No matter how many Christmases they had. No matter how many times he had to come home late during the holidays. No matter who they faced in the future.

She's not sure he truly does even though he nods and pushes her gently away from him so that they can stand. He grabs the first aid kit from the top of the bar and motions towards the hall. She follows him, helping him shed his coat and jacket, watches him undo his vest, and notes that, of all things, he's lost his tie along the way.

* * *

Morning comes before the both of them even realized they'd fallen asleep, and Liz peeks an eye open at the sound of wheels rolling across the carpet. Standing next to the bed is Agnes, smiling brightly, her little hand gripping the handle of her rolling luggage, wearing her pajamas and a traveling backpack Aram got her, and she's practically buzzing with excitement.

"Why are you guys _still_ sleeping?" Liz presses her face into Red's shirt a little to hide her smile, and wraps her arm around him just a little tighter. He grunts, but doesn't open his eyes, and Liz regrets glancing at the clock.

"Aggie, it's _six_ in the morning." She says quietly, wanting Red to get a little more than three hours of sleep after the last two days he's had. But her daughter simply jumps up and down and tells her in a rush that she was checking the weather, of all things, and that there's a storm that's supposed to set in before tomorrow evening or something like that, and they have to pack _right now_ , _or else._

* * *

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's the second part! Enjoy! ^^

"But papa, _why_ must I wear my boots if we aren't playing in the snow?"

"You still have to walk to the sleigh, don't you?"

"Oh, right."

"Plus, we need your toes to stay nice and warm."

She can hear the two of them from the bottom of the stairs as she grabs the expensive coat her husband conveniently "found" for her while conducting business in Canada a few weeks prior. Their domestic chatter filled up the cabin with as much warmth as the fire place, and Elizabeth found herself pausing, one arm into the coat, so that she could slip it on a little more quietly in order to hear what they were saying.

"And why must I wear this big jacket if there is a blanket?"

"Because it's cold outside."

"But, papa, you said your hugs chase _away_ the cold, and I have your hugs _and_ the blanket _and_ mommy _and_ dedoolya."

"Those are all magnificent points, my princess, but any Knight worth his salt _knows_ that, having sworn to defend his princess's body, soul, and spirit, he cannot do _all_ of those things if he is hugging her the whole time."

"No matter how much he wants to?"

"No matter how much he wants to."

Smiling as she listens to them counter back and forth, she grabs her gloves from the counter in the kitchen before making her way towards the door by the back porch where she can just see Red's figure positioned on one knee; a tiny, booted foot resting on the other so that he can tie the bows of Agnes's laces more securely.

" _There_ ," He says in a voice that conveys a sense of excitement, tapping the side of her boot as if to emphasize a job well done. Liz rounds the corner towards them and nearly laughs at the scowl on Dom's face as he sits beside Agnes; appearing very much like a scolded child. He's staring at Red's mischievous grin as if it were the epitome of all evil.

"Are we ready to go?" There's an excited smile from her daughter as she spots her, and Liz welcomes her bouncing baby girl into her arms, spinning around once, when Agnes all but vaults off the bench the two men had placed her on. "I'll take that as a _yes_." She laughs as she tucks a strand of her daughter's dirty-blonde hair behind her ear.

"Papa and dedoolya are fighting, again." Agnes whispers the news into her ear and leans away in that manner which children have a habit, as though making sure that she is being taken seriously. Mother and daughter stare at one another for a brief moment before Liz raises her voice loud enough for Red and Dom to hear.

"Oh they _are_ , are they?" The two men manage to cast accusatory glances at one another before they both look at her and shrug. The synchronicity of their movements let's her know that, in the past few years, they have _definitely_ been spending too much time together. "And what's this fight about?" Agnes looks between her father and grandfather with a mixture of confusion and curiosity.

"A name."

"A name?" She immediately looks to Red who has pursed his lips in contemplation but seems to draw a conclusion after a moment and gives her a smile that makes him look as though he's the cat that ate the canary. "I don't suppose you're going to explain that smile on your face?"

"There's nothing to explain, Lizzie. Everything is well in hand, I think." And Liz thinks a guilty man has never looked so smug.

"Uh-huh. Dedushka, what do you have to say for yourself?" Dom looks down at his own boots, arms folded across his chest. " _Dedushka_."

"Your..." Dom looks over at Red with a sort of derision he only knows how to harbor for a short while; a kind of irritation that, much like a lighted match, sputters and dies when it's burned itself out. " _Husband_ , has impugned my honor as a grandfather, a great-grandfather, _his elder,_ no less, and he won't apologize for it."

" _Impugned_ your _honor_?" She looks to Red who stands there as if enjoying the quiet victory of the moment. "What did you say?" She can't withhold the smile forming on her lips. It's at that moment, looking at her father, that Agnes mutters something under her breath that draws the attention of all three adults. And, damn him, Red looks so proud of her that, if Dom were to poke him, Liz believed he might burst.

"You see?" Dom tosses his arms in the air, his face a mask of agitation. And, since Liz knows better, her grandfather's antics are entirely too forced for him to fully mean them. "My sweet, _innocent_ little granddaughter knows it, and it's going to become a habit now that _he's_ introduced it to her vocabulary."

" _Relax,_ " Red looks at Dom as if to brush the conversation away. "It's harmless."

"Harmless? Their brains are _sponges_ at this age, Raymond." Their arguing has honestly been one of Elizabeth's favorite things since meeting Dominik, and she's so caught up in her amusement, and the fact that she is so endeared to these two men, that Agnes has to tug at her coat collar to get her attention.

"What does it mean, mommy?" Even Liz doesn't know. The word, though Russian, is a complete mystery and no doubt stumbling in her daughter's pronunciation.

"I don't know, pumpkin, why don't you ask your father?" Liz turns with a crocodile smile to Red who narrows his eyes a little at her beyond his smirking and shrugs. He walks over to Agnes, places his hands up to her ear, and whispers what Liz can only guess is the answer. Having been the one holding Agnes, she thought she would have heard what Red had stated but it was just a hiss of noise and nothing more.

Agnes pulls away from her father's hands and gives him a look of disbelief before casting a reproachful look upon her grandfather for the apparent ridiculousness of it all. A split second later, Agnes gives a very Raymond-esque chuckle and squirms out of her mother's arms to go take hold of her grandfather's hand in order to pull him up off the bench. "Come on you old fart, let's go see the sleigh."

Dom sputters, mouth opening and closing, looking back at Red and Liz with a, "Did you hear that? Masha, I _told you_ he would be a terrible influen-" before Agnes tugs him out the door.

Liz watches Agnes and Dom carefully descend the icy porch steps outside, before she turns to find Red staring at the retreating image of their daughter and Dom with the most profound look of adoration and contentment she has ever seen. Though she is loath to vanish such a look, Liz swats at his arm and shakes her head at him when he recoils dramatically; a slight pout on his face.

"So you're teaching our daughter Russian _slurs_ now, are you?" Red turns to her, reaching out to grasp the edges of her shoulders before gliding his hands down the red fabric of her arms. Her gaze trails from his own, to the cuts and fading bruises on his face, and land briefly on his lips before making a return journey to his eyes. His hands have stopped at the junction of her elbows and he gives a little squeeze, tugging her just the slightest bit closer; his eyes shining with affection and amusement.

"I hardly think старпер is a _slur_ , Elizabeth." Liz rolls her eyes and reaches up to adjust the lapels of his coat and the scarf around his neck before slipping her arms into the warmth of his jacket to snake them around his lower back; their knees mingling when the move brings her body nearly flush against his own. Red looks at her expectantly, giving a slight, appreciative hum in reaction, and when she meets his warm gaze, a rush of heat spreads through her and leaves her breathless.

"Don't give me that look, Raymond." Though tempting, they still had a carriage ride and a visit from Santa to get through tonight. Balking just a little, Red tilts his head at her as if he has no idea what she's talking about.

"What look?" She smiles and stifles a laugh, a part of her immediately recognizing her desire to remain in these safe little moments for longer than they last. Thanks to Agnes's diligent perusal of the weather yesterday morning, it was a tiny miracle that they'd even made it to the cabin before a fresh layer of snow arrived this afternoon. And while it hadn't been a storm by any means, if they hadn't left a half a day earlier than they planned, the roads might have been too dangerous given how tired the two of them were. On top of the close calls and the worry of the last four days, the fact that he was standing here, preparing a perfectly normal Christmas with her and their daughter, felt a bit surreal.

The three of them had grown too accustomed to a quick change of plans and making the most of what they could in years past.

"Don't play coy, you know _exactly_ which look." Challenging and playful, Liz leans up and gives him a peck on the lips. Red responds by holding her there against him, and Liz can feel her breath catch in her chest again. With their lips just a breath apart and their eyes glittering with intent, the back door opens in a rush of cold air and reveals Dom staring in wry amusement at the both of them.

"Are you two going to make bedroom eyes at each other all evening or are we going to go on this damn carriage ride?" Red smirks down at Liz and then turns his attention to Dom. Collecting themselves, Liz and Red follow him out into the back. Liz breaks away from the two of them to scoop up her daughter who has been left standing with the driver: an elderly woman who is showing Agnes the ins and outs of the bells along the two horse's collars and traces. They make themselves comfortable under the blankets as they seat themselves, and Red delves into the differences between a _sleigh_ and a _carriage,_ to which Dom continues to mutter and mock him for a good five minutes into their ride along the river trails while mother and daughter exchange amused glances and perfectly identical eye rolls at the men.

* * *

They arrive back at the cabin just as the last traces of sunlight filter out of the sky. The temperature is starting to drop rather dramatically, and Red ushers Liz, Agnes, and Dom inside to get warm while he and the driver, whose name, Liz discovered during the ride, was Dottie, got the horses some water and a few treats for the return trip home. Dottie, it seemed, was a neighbor of Dom's from down the road; a kindly, salt of the earth woman that Red had met once about eighteen years ago. It didn't surprise Liz to know that Dottie remembered him for his charming ways, nor that Dom seemed more than interested to hear about that little story. The two of them, had apparently never told Dom that they knew one another. And Liz is almost ninety-percent sure it's cause Red was keeping tabs on Dom through Dottie's good graces.

Fifteen minutes later, the back door opens and shuts, and Liz looks up from the tea she's been making as Red shirks out of his coat and hangs it on the hook by the door. He gives her a small smile, one she returns, and comes around the counter to brace his hip against it in order to lean closer to her.

"Tell me she's sound asleep because she doesn't want Santa to skip her." He stifles a yawn half-way through the sentence, and Liz can't help but think the lackadaisical expression on his face after is adorable. While she also feels a pang of guilt knowing that exhaustion was likely catching up with him, she smirks and shakes her head.

"Nope, Grandpa is to read her a Christmas Carole until papa comes to give her a kiss goodnight." Liz lifts the tea bag from her mug and squeezes the remaining water from it, making a tiny face at the way the heat burns just a little before tossing it in the trash. "Her words, not mine. I was kicked out." She frowns just a little and takes a small sip of her tea. "She's been pretty attached to you since you got home."  _I think she's worried._  

"I keep catching her staring at me, at the," He brings his hand up to wave at the general area of the left side of his face, and Liz sets her mug down on the counter to look at him, and after a moment of staring off in the direction of the dining room, Red turns to her. "It's not alarming me now so much as the thought of when she grows up, when she'll remember more, when she recognizes the violence we have to contend with." Liz studies his face as he speaks, following his eyes as they look off over her shoulder as though he's seeing a thousand and one scenarios that concern him.

"If you're afraid she's going to ask us to stop some day, you should be." She reaches out to place her hand over his and lets her fingers slip just under his palm to curl there in a gentle grip. "She _will_ ask, and we will have to explain to her why it's important." This was not a new topic for them. It wasn't even a new discussion. The questions would come. The desperation and the sorrow and the stress would come. She didn't have to explain the psychology of all that to him.

Kids asked questions, and lying to their daughter was out of the question. Answers like, your father can't always be there because there are bad guys he needs to protect you from, would turn into discussions about papa being an internationally wanted criminal and mommy being an adjunct field agent assigned to a team that didn't officially exist, that worked out the cool building with the bright yellow elevator she used to ride in when she was little. Because, at some point, her God-parents wouldn't just be the fun people with the cool stuff, they would be soldiers in a war to prevent global control by shadow governments and people with money in all the wrong things. 

It was going to be a bit of a nightmare, but nightmares were their specialty.

Their lives would still infiltrate hers, and there was no way to prevent it. As Agnes has gotten older, their attitudes about parenting have flipped. Where Liz had once been the panicked and fearful mother of a newborn, willing to do anything to keep her safe, Raymond was the worried and fearful father of a precocious five-year old who was going to get older and wiser and less oblivious to the danger in her and her family's way of life.

Red grips her hand tightly and there's a kind of sadness about his smile that echoes a dozen memories of the last eight years since she met him. "You didn't want that for her."

Liz's faked death still sits in awkward corners of their life, a dull and chronic pain prone to flaring up at the most inconvenient of times. She always knew that she would never fully get rid of what she'd done. And though the sting of the topic and the memory for him has lessened over the years, she knows that the hurt she caused comes back the way all old griefs do; a cyclical and determined shadow of brief desolation and ruin.

"I don't. And you don't, either." Her eyes travel down to their hands. She's brought back to the day she shot that undercover cop while on the run with him, and a smile finds its way onto her face. "This life has a mind and momentum of its own. And while I can't find any good reason to subject her to what we go through, I also know that we're the safest people she can be with." She looks back up at him and he's got a pinched expression that has stopped halfway between concession and a wince as his own words come back to haunt him. "Plus, I'm _pretty_ sure it's about five years and seven months too late to take that night on the container ship back, don't you think?"

He stares at her, at her teasing look, and when he remains quiet, Liz finds her brow furrowing in concern. A dozen questions about the events that took him away from them four days ago pop into her head, and as if sensing her worry, Red slides around the corner of the kitchen to come up behind her; wrapping his arms around her and placing a kiss where her neck slopes into her shoulder.

"I wouldn't trade that night for the world, Elizabeth." The warmth of his breath on her skin and the low rumble of his voice cast a shiver down her spine and Liz all but melts into him; shutting her eyes and breathing deeply as he turns his face into her hair.

"Neither would I." Ensconced in his presence and the comfort of the cabin and the peace this entire day has brought her, Liz feels a sweeping sense of gratitude for how terribly things had gone in order for her to be right here, right now. Turning, bringing her arms up to her chest so that she is nestled against him, she turns her face into the fabric of his shirt and lets him hold her there for an indeterminable amount of time.

* * *

At some point, Red makes his way into Agnes's room where he finds Dom blinking tiredly, glasses perched on his nose, with a dozing little girl curled up against him as he reads to her about Mr. Scrooge's change of heart. Red switches places with Dom, and it almost seems as if Agnes is about to get a second wind when she sees her father, perking up a bit so that she can listen to him as he finishes the story. He's read it so many times, that, when asked if he needed the reading glasses Dom had been using, he declined, opting out on account of ego, memory, and the disdain he feels for falling asleep with his glasses on.

Liz checked in on them ten minutes later, and to no surprise, Red and Agnes were sound asleep; the book splayed open and resting on Red's chest as Agnes clutched a fistful of his shirt in her hand. It reminds Liz of Agnes as a baby; how her hands would always find some way to hold on to him, as if knowing, inherently, that the world would try to rip him from her life.

That night, it is Dom and Liz up until the wee hours of the morning preparing the cabin as if Santa had come down the chimney; dusting soot in certain places, and creating footprints on the floor leading from the fireplace to the tree where Agnes's gifts are laid out in such a way that she couldn't possibly miss them. Stockings are filled with candy and Dom eats a few cookies they'd left out and leaves one half-eaten.

"Evidence," He says, when Liz asks why Santa would only take _one huge bite_ out of a cookie and leave it on the plate. It seemed rather rude. Her grandfather just shoos her away from his part of the gig and drinks nearly all the milk, as well. All in all, it took them about an hour to complete their tasks, and, after surveying their handiwork and tossing any and all evidence of Santa's true identity, Dom dusts boots, and they head off to bed.

* * *

In the morning, Liz wakes to the excited voice of her daughter and the distinct, resounding rumble of Red's response down stairs.  
It's a weekend of family.  
Of burdens borne and lifted.  
Of little stories about her mother when she was Anges's age.

And when they leave, Agnes's bike from Santa in the back of the suburban along with a dollhouse from Dom, Liz finds herself looking at Red as they leave the veritable haven that has become Dom's cabin in the woods. It's in these brief seconds of leaving that she feels the regret and longing for a permanent life the way they experienced it this weekend.  
With rest,  
and laughter,  
and a reality that didn't seek to make them bleed or suffer.

But then, looking back at Agnes as she watches the forest drift by, she entwines her arm with Red's where his elbow rests on the center console, leaning against him slightly, and thinks that these days of peace and rest are only sweet and treasured because of the difficulties that they face. And, she decides, as they drive back into the world of inherited wars and strife, that she wouldn't trade any sort of life that would ruin or dull the sensation of blessed normalcy that existed and made special the memories they had just created...

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There you are, mymostpreciousking! I hope you liked the final installment, haha I don't think I've ever written something this fluffy before xD I'm sorry it got mildly angsty at the end. I honestly don't know how that stuff slips in there but it does haha. I also didn't know how to end it, so I'm sorry if it seems a little disjointed there. ^^ I hope the rest of you reading enjoyed this little bit as well. (p.s. I decided to spell out the words for grandpa and great-grandpa phonetically instead of throwing the Russian in there. Although, I kept the 'old fart' translation in Russian, so go figure haha so 'dedushka' is grandpa, and I believe that 'dedoolya' is also grandpa, but a diminutive of the word<3)

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry it's a little late! But I hope you enjoyed it! It seemed to be the gift that keeps on giving, so the next chapter will be up tomorrow as a little something extra so it wasn't crazy long! Again, I hope you had an amazing Christmas, mymostpreciousking! ^^


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